Smarter Than a Monkey
by Danyella Skyler Silverfire
Summary: Luffy tells the story of how he was declared smarter than a monkey.


**Title:** Smarter Than a Monkey  
**Fandom:** One Piece  
**Author:** Danyella Skyler Silverfire  
**Website:** Livejournal, Insanejournal, or  
**Rating:** PG-13  
**Genre(s):** Humor  
**Pairing(s):** None  
**Summary:** Luffy tells the story of how he was declared smarter than a monkey.  
**Disclaimer:** Checks reality meter (It's remarkably Magic Eight Ball shaped). {{shake}}{{shake}} Do I own One Piece? Nope, still the right reality. Go eat a tuna sandwich instead. {{stares}} Damn.  
**Author's Note:** Yup. I'm really weird. But it came up in conversation with Kage Kashu, and then demanded to be written.  
**Word Count:** 610

Smarter Than a Monkey

Ace always thought that Luffy was the best toy his parents ever gave him. To be fair, Ace knew Luffy wasn't really a toy. This usually happened when Ace had to beat up some idiot that thought they could get away with picking on _his_ brother. Even if they're two hundred pound goons. But Luffy always seemed to find ways to reaffirm his toy status.

For instance, when Ace came back from his current "training" with Garp to find out Luffy was now rubber, his reaction was heard the village over. "_COOL!_"

Obviously he wasn't put off by Luffy's new abilities. In fact, it opened up all new venues of play. Which led eventually to the current game: paddle ball. Only with Luffy as the ball and his arm the rubber band, due to Luffy's clutching a nut in his fist that was through the huge paddle Ace had somehow gotten.

Unfortunately that was how Garp found them. "_ACE!_"

Ace jolted and Luffy yelped in terror. "_Grandpa!_" and let go of the nut, causing his hand to slip through the hole and him to go flying at Ace's next hit.

"Shit! _Luffy!_" Ace yelped as he bolted after his brother, who was flying in a graceful arc out into the middle of the harbor. A soft fall yes, but a soft _water_ fall.

Without pausing he dove off the end of the dock and made his way as quickly as he could to where Luffy had sunk.

* * *

"...and that's when I was declared officially smarter than a monkey!" Luffy cheerfully concluded, to his enthralled and horrified crew.

"I guess that _would_ prove it," Zoro conceded.

"I'm not sure how they decided that though," Luffy said, with a cheerful grin.

"...I'll explain it to you later," Nami muttered, before wandering off dazedly to find a drink.

* * *

The next day Zoro was approached by a bouncing Luffy and perversely proud Usopp.

"Wanna play paddle ball, Zoro?" Luffy asked excitedly.

"Paddle ball?"

"Like my story yesterday. Usopp even made a paddle."

Usopp held up the paddle in demonstration.

It took a little more convincing, but they eventually convinced Zoro to go along with it.

An hour later Zoro was still paddling a madly laughing Luffy pretty far out to sea when on one of his returns Luffy was holding a piece of meat in his hand.

Zoro nicely kept paddling Luffy in the same direction, figuring it'd save the crew a _little_ trouble for Luffy to forage off whatever was giving him the food. After a while though he stopped coming back with food and instead had treasure.

Meanwhile

Buggy was happily regaling his illustrious guest, Portgas D. Ace, with the story of one of his better raids when he suddenly felt the chest his foot was propped on disappear, causing him to overbalance and fall on his face. Once he pulled himself up and looked around he was surprised to find that there was a lot less piled up loot than there had been last he looked.

Moving quickly into action, Buggy sent his crew on a desperate search for where it disappeared to only to find that every time he looked away from it the pile would get smaller. This continued on until finally there was no more treasure on the deck, and that's when he discovered the culprit.

Monkey D. Luffy had one arm wrapped around a surprised Alvida and was kissing her while Ace calmly held Alvida in place and kept her from being stolen. Just when Buggy was snapping out of his startled daze, Luffy let her go and with a loud, triumphant laugh disappeared over the horizon.

* * *

**Author's Note:** This came from me having heard a story about how you catch wild monkeys. You put a treat in the bottom of a bottle with a neck small enough for the monkeys hand to reach in and grab the treat but not so wide that they can pull their hand out so long as they hold onto the treat. The apparently the monkeys don't let go of the treat and can run away with the awkward weight of the jar. Not sure if that's true or not, but it was a good story premise.


End file.
